The Great Famine of 2006: A Long, Hungry Winter Sets In; The World’s Last Chance to Prevent It Slips Away

What follows is a status report on the most urgent, compelling human rights issue of all–what increasingly looks like the making of the next Great Famine. The last one, which took place in the 1990’s, killed approximately two million people. If you are in a position to take any kind of action–including something as modest as writing your member of Congress or posting a link on your own blog–this is my urgent appeal to raise public outrage to prevent this. Whatever your political views of the North Korean regime, the people of North Korea have little influence over, or responsibility for its policies. As Ronald Reagan stated, “A hungry child knows no politics.”

Some may privately conclude that a renewed famine sets the stage for the overthrow of the nefarious regime in Pyongyang. If I believed this to be true, I would still say that allowing millions to starve would not be worth the cost. That view is also false. Starving people do not rebel. They leave their homes in search of food, weaken, and die. During the last Great Famine, those who starved were disproportionately those the regime trusted the least. That is likely to be the case again this winter.

Famine will not end this regime; it will only end innocent lives. What will end this regime is knowledge by the people of North Korea that the outside world is compassionate, free, and prosperous. Policies that allow aid workers to get food directly to the hungry will advance that goal. And although the North’s reaction to outside pressure is always a matter of some conjecture, the regime does sometimes bend to severe international criticism, and has become highly dependent on its trade relationships with the outside world.

This week, new and disturbing reports tell us that the U.N. World Food Program’s food relief operation has now begun to shut down the factories it uses to feed 6.5 million North Koreans. More experts are expressing their doubts that North Korea can feed its population without the food aid it rejects, and refugees continue to flee from what they describe as famine conditions in their homeland.

It is clear that food is not in greater supply than in previous years, that the cutoff of food aid will exacerbate that problem, and that without the rise of world outrage, North Korea will have no incentive to change its policies that have thus far prevented food from reaching the hungry. If the food were to begin flowing today, it would not arrive in time to save many. The world is on notice. The U.N. dereliction of its duty will not easily be forgiven.

To put this into perspective, some background is appropriate.

At pages 186-187 of his book, The Great North Korean Famine, Andrew Natsios, now the Administrator of USAID, explains the standards by which international relief agencies had once agreed to operate.

Humanitarian relief agencies had faced similar challenges in other crises where food aid had been politically abused. Their unhappy experiences in Bosnia, Somalia, and Sudan led in 1993 to the drafting of a set of standards called the Code of Conduct, widely accepted by relief agencies, designed to preclude or at least limit this abuse.

Natsios then summarizes the code, but his summary doesn’t include some of the most compelling language, which I borrow directly from the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies:

1: The Humanitarian imperative comes first.The right to receive humanitarian assistance, and to offer it, is a fundamental humanitarian principle which should be enjoyed by all citizens of all countries. As members of the international community, we recognise our obligation to provide humanitarian assistance wherever it is needed. Hence the need for unimpeded access to affected populations, is of fundamental importance in exercising that responsibility. . . .

2: Aid is given regardless of the race, creed or nationality of the recipients and without adverse distinction of any kind. Aid priorities are calculated on the basis of need alone . . . . The implementation of such a universal, impartial and independent policy, can only be effective if we and our partners have access to the necessary resources to provide for such equitable relief, and have equal access to all disaster victims.

3: Aid will not be used to further a particular political or religious standpoint. . . .

4: We shall endeavour not to act as instruments of government foreign policy. . . . NGHAs are agencies which act independently from governments. We therefore formulate our own policies and implementation strategies and do not seek to implement the policy of any government, except in so far as it coincides with our own independent policy. . . .

5: We shall respect culture and custom. . . .

6: We shall attempt to build disaster response on local capacities. . . .

7: Ways shall be found to involve programme beneficiaries in the management of relief aid. . . .

8: Relief aid must strive to reduce future vulnerabilities to disaster as well as meeting basic needs. All relief actions affect the prospects for long term development, either in a positive or a negative fashion. Recognising this, we will strive to implement relief programmes which actively reduce the beneficiaries’ vulnerability to future disasters and h elp create sustainable lifestyles. We will pay particular attention to environmental concerns in the design and management of relief programmes. We will also endeavour to minimise the negative impact of humanitarian assistance, seeking to avoid long term beneficiary dependence upon external aid.

9: We hold ourselves accountable to both those we seek to assist and those from whom we accept resources. . . . We recognise the obligation to ensure appropriate monitoring of aid distributions and to carry out regular assessments of the impact of disaster assistance. We will also seek to report, in an open fashion, upon the impact of our work, and the factors limiting or enhancing that impact. . . .

10: In our information, publicity and advertising activities, we shall recognise disaster victims as dignified humans, not hopeless objects. . . . While we will co-operate with the media in order to enhance public response, we will not allow external or internal demands for publicity to take precedence over the principle of maximising overall relief assistance. . . .

I’ve already noted the reports of numerous international aid agencies, describing how North Korea discriminated against the least favored political classes in its public food distribution. Natsios provides much additional evidence of North Korea’s discriminatory practices. In this and other ways, the code proved no match (p. 187) for the regime’s recalcitrance:

By the summer of 1997 relief agencies were privately wringing their collective hands that the North Korean government had trashed the Code of Conduct without the least protest by anyone. . . . These violations were more systematice, more widespread, and more egregious than in any crisis since the code was written. . . .

Nearly all of these principles require unimpeded access to victims, accountability of aid, and the complete transparency of relief operations, none of which existed in North Korea. The eligibility lists for receiving relief aid were compiled entirely by government official; no one knew for sure who was on these lists, since NGOs were not allowed to have Korean speakers or readers in their delegations. The recipients could well have been party cadre and military families.

Thus, instead of insisting on accountability and fair distribution, the World Food Program accomodated the regime’s wish to keep its population isolated from the outside world.

1997-1998: Triage

Why did the WFP raise so few public objections to a policy that can most charitably be described as mass negligent homicide? Natsios paints an unflattering picture of the relief operation, with its personalities and organizations riven by personal and ideological factions and intrigues. Some were openly sympathetic to what they saw as the North’s “egalitarian” distribution system. The prevailing faction believed that the WFP must preserve “access” to North Korea at all costs, and that it must therefore avoid statements that might challenge or offend the regime.

This extraordinary deference even extended to a North Korean decision not to feed certain areas at all. In some areas of North Korea, called “closed” counties, the WFP has never had a presence, and in fact has no idea whether the people have ever received food aid (refugees report receiving little or none). Andrew Natsios describes how this worked (p. 175):

WFP Food aid access map of North Korea, circa 2003–courtesy of the North Korean Freedom Coalition.

“I still have a WFP map distributed at a UN headquarters coordination meeting in the summer of 1997 showing their areas of operation; the map carefully excluded the three northeastern provinces. Some relief workers and analysts began to wonder whether there was something the regime was hiding that cold not be as easily disguised as in other areas of the country. [A senior aid worker] wondered why the regime was so insistent that no one visit the Northeast; she suspected that something was seriously wrong in the region. Did the regime want to avoid pressure to divert food from other regions of the country by precluding any assessments of the Northeast, a prerequisite for food deliveries? What concerned me from the beginning of 1997 was that the central government might be using the humanitarian organizations’ standards to their advantage, because the UN agencies and NGOs refused to deliver food to the areas where they were given no access. In fact, Western aid organizations were unknowing and unwilling pawns in executing the central authorities’ triage strategy.”

On page 91 of his book, Natsios claims that this triage strategy killed more than a million people in the mid- to late-1990s, which would represent perhaps half of the total famine deaths that decade. Obviously, there is room to question that figure, given the lack of observers on the ground. It is mostly compiled from refugee reports and statistics provided by defectors.

Above: Andrew Natsios in the Sudan.

The WFP thus faced growing public criticism of its inadequate monitoring at a time when it was making a new appeal for food aid, estimating that 6.5 million North Koreans depended on its aid. Most compelling was a new study by Marcus Noland and Stephen Haggard, which concluded that the North was cynically managing its internal food supply by shifting its purchases toward “commercial” items, including arms, when food aid arrived from the outside.

The limited evidence suggested that the 2005 harvest would not be a good one. In the Spring, the regime mobilized hundreds of thousands of city dwellers and sent them to the fields to help with the planting. One agricultural expert who viewed the crops in the summer pronounced their progress alarmingly poor. In July, when hunger might tempt farmers to “pre-harvest” portions of their crops, the L.A. Times reported widespread food shortages in Chongjin, the North’s fourth-largest city, in the Northeast.

In this environment, the WFP had actually begun to take a tougher line and demand more access for its monitors. The North Koreans would not be outdone at brinksmanship. In late August, they announced that because harvests were up, they no longer needed food aid and would thereafter accept only “development aid.”

Richard Ragan, who has served as in-country director of the World Food Program (WFP) for the past two years, was told in late August by the North Korean regime to halt all his program’s food shipments here by the end of the year.

They’ve been hinting for the past year they wanted us out,” Mr. Ragan says. “They don’t like our monitoring,” he adds, alluding to the WFP’s persistent, if often unsuccessful, efforts at making sure the food got to the neediest, rather than to the North’s 1.1 million troops or to a small circle of party and government officials.
. . . .

With a slightly sardonic grin, he says, “Maybe the fact we’ve been asked to leave is an indication we’ve been pretty successful” in helping to rescue North Korea from a famine in the years since the WFP set up shop here in 1995.

Elsewhere, Ragan conceded that “there are large numbers of people in the country who are struggling to meet their basic food needs.” Incredibly, the WFP reaction was to go along with the North Korean demand, announce that food aid would end in January, and seek “development aid” from donor governments:

Richard Ragan, head of the World Food Program’s office in Pyongyang, told The Associated Press the agency will focus on development projects in North Korea. Discussions are continuing with donors to find support for the shift, he said in a telephone interview while in Beijing.

North Korea has made requests to halt emergency food aid in the past, and Ragan said officials for the communist regime told him they believed they are now able to meet their food needs.

“They claim they have enough food coming in from other sources,” he said, indicating that included aid from South Korea and increased trade with China. “They didn’t want to create a culture of dependency.”

U.N. Humanitarian Affairs Chief Jan Eggeland asked North Korea to reverse the decision, stating the obvious fact that the regime was not in a condition to feed its people. International aid organizations that faced imminent expulsion were stunned. The WFP made plans to shut down its food production operations in the event the regime did not reverse its decision.

At the same time, it was not entirely clear what “development aid” would mean:

Gerald Bourke, a spokesman for the WFP, said that UN staff were currently discussing with the North Korean government what this meant in practice – adding that he was hopeful that current food-for-work and other community-based projects would class as longer-term development.

Andrew Natsios, now responsible for the U.S. government’s food aid programs, would have none of it:

Andrew Natsios told a symposium hosted by the private U.S. Committee for Human Rights in North Korea that since Washington’s food aid to the North goes through the UN World Food Program (WFP), it would have to stop if WFP staff leave the country as Pyongyang has demanded.

Natsios said development aid to the North, which it asked for instead, was not allowed by law and needed fresh parliamentary approval. He added development aid required even stricter monitoring than food relief. Natsios warned direct, effectively unmonitored food aid from South Korea and China often failed to reach those who need it most and could thus increase the number of North Korean refugees.

South Korea and China, however, continue to distribute aid directly to the regime, with only token monitoring of how the aid is distributed. Critics like Noland, Haggard, and Jason Lim, writing in the New York Times, argue that this undercut the WFP’s efforts to pressure the regime into accepting broader monitoring.

The WFP has sought a North Korean reconsideration, but to no avail.

What of the North Korean claim that harvests were up, and that food aid is no longer needed? Could this be true? Patently, it is not.

This recent first-hand report states that in the Northeast, where hunger is generally most acute, the harvest was almost a complete failure. The defector news site Daily NK reported that some young men had starved to death in the Northwest last summer. Published reports also confirmed that food appears to be in short supply in many areas, notwithstanding some of those reports’ credulous acceptance of North Korean assertions that that harvests were up. Even the pliable Richard Ragan stated, “The jury is still out on whether they’ll have a successful crop or not.”

As recently as today, reports emerged of refugees fleeing the North and reporting widespread hunger:

BANGKOK, Nov. 20 (Yonhap) — Twelve North Koreans have been arrested on charges of illegal entry into the Chiang Saen District of Thailand bordering Laos in the Golden Triangle, a local newspaper reported Sunday.

The Bangkok Post said the detainees had escaped from North Korea into China’s Yunnan Province and took a boat on the Mekong River to the village of Muang Mom in Laos before crossing to the Thai side of the border.

They were spotted by patrol police and arrested for not having travel documents. The detainees said they were forced to flee as a result of the prolonged famine and poverty in North Korea.

They hope to be deported to South Korea to seek asylum there, but will be deported to a third country, according to the paper.

One hopes that this third country will be The Philippines, and not China.

In an interview with the Joongang Ilbo last week, Marcus Noland offered another explanation for the North Korean claim, one that doesn’t directly dispute the veracity of the North Korean claim:

One thing that many people seem to be missing in the recent developments in North Korea, including attempting to resuscitate the public distribution system and banning private trade in grains, is that this has been made possible not only by somewhat better-than-normal harvests and aid from South Korea, China, and others, but also by confiscatory seizures of grain in the rural areas.

In essence, the North Korean government has gone back on its promise to allow farmers to dispose of a certain amount of their production either from the cooperatives or private plots as they see fit “• i.e. in the market . . . . Instead the North Korean government has just seized the grain at gunpoint. And while because of the better-than-average harvest this year and the aid, they may get away with reconstituting the public distribution system this year, they are setting themselves up for a problem next year when the farmers revert to the coping strategies of the famine-era: pre-harvesting, hoarding, tending secret plots, diverting production into illicit markets, etc. This strikes me as a recipe for repression and violence.
(emphasis mine)

Whatever the merits of the argument that the WFP must preserve access at all costs, it has been carried to the point where it is now indefensible. If the goal is to preserve access, the one concession that the WFP cannot defend is the effective termination of its access. This week, we learn that the effect of the North Korean decree has gone beyond even that. The WFP operation appears to be unravelling:

The U.N. humanitarian aid group has suspended a number of food production factories in North Korea in line with the country’s demand to end its operation by the end of the year, the group’s weekly emergency report said Friday.

The World Food Program (WFP) said its negotiations with the DPRK continued throughout this week on the status of the organization’s operations next year.

. . . .

“No conclusion was reached, but the parties agreed to continue negotiations over the next several weeks,” the report said.

Pending issues at the talks include the size of and operational conditions for future WFP programs and the number of international staff allowed to reside in North Korea, it said.

Pyongyang has asked the WFP to end its humanitarian program in North Korea, which centered on food aid and distribution over the past decade during which the communist state suffered severe food shortages resulting in massive starvation.

North Korea now insists it has enough food through its own production and through aid from other countries outside of WFP. It wants the assistance to shift to development programs.

“As part of the commitment to end the current humanitarian operation, food distributions and monitoring will progressively be scaled down from Nov. 30 until the end of the year,” the report said.

“This week, local food production in 19 WFP-supported factories was suspended as sufficient food had been produced to last for the balance of the year,” it said.

It may well be what the WFP had feared most: that its efforts to feed those in greatest need would cause the North Korean regime to shut down most of the WFP’s effort. Yet the WFP, placed in a position where it has little to lose, chooses not to raise international alarm over what now appears to be a return of the famine. The WFP seems willing to accept the loss of its access to preserve what little access it still has–which is virtually none.

Public outrage could translate into measures such as an arms embargo or asset freezes that would hurt the North Korean regime badly enough that it would accede to WFP monitoring demands. Faced with the imminent shut-down of its entire operation, it is difficult to see why the U.N. fails to do everything within its power to prevent the next Great North Korean Famine.